Arabs Fled Israel Before War Fearing Arab Violence

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
1

So I’ve been reading Cairo to Damascus by Armenian American John Roy Carlson, and encountered a passage wherein he described the reality of Arabs who left Palestine just before the War of Independence 1948. (below)

The book is an account of how he infiltrated the Ikhwan (Muslim Brotherhood) in the 1940s in the ME.
He also wrote Undercover, wherein he infiltrated the Amercian Nazi Party. Explorer of the humn nderbelly, to be sure. A brave man and a fine writer.

Jewhaters, beware, I will NOT be responding to hate-filled comments. This extract is for those genuinley interested in history.

I am posting this to counter the lies, hatred and genocidal wet dreams of the “Nakba”/Marxist crowds today.

Cairo to Damascus:
Refugees
pp. 234-236:

To everyone’s astonishment the Arabs were losing on nearly every front. Haifa, the leading port in the Middle East, with an Arab population of seventy thousand and a priceless oil refinery, had fallen to the Jews within thirty hours. Palestine’s second port, Jaffa, an all-Arab city adjoining Tel Aviv, had crumbled into Jewish hands.

Some fifty thousand Arabs had fled Jaffa.2 Farther north, Safad, Tiberius, and the fortress city of Acre – which even Napoleon could not capture from the Turks – had all been seized by the Haganah in a series of brilliant maneuvers. What innate power motivated these sons of David? I didn’t yet have the answer from the Jewish side. But with the Arabs I had been learning some of the reasons why the Jehad was daily proving such a failure.

Moustafa, however, seemed to have no worries. Toward evening one day I found him sitting on a rock. I walked up quietly and say beside him.

“Things are not going so well with us, Moustafa,” I said.

“The Jews haven’t tasted real Arab steel and lead yet,” Moustafa said confidently. “Artour, you have seen only the work of untrained volunteers. You are making a mistake if you judge the power of the regular Arab armies from these Holy Warriors. What we are doing here is tiring the Jew, worrying him, keeping him running here and there until the armies of Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and fighters from Yemen and Saudi Arabia and the Moslem countries of North Africa join the Jehad.” He paused. “Then you will see slaughter, Artour. Then you will see us march to Tel Aviv.”

“How long will it take us, Moustafa?”

“Thirty days – not thirty-one – but thirty days to conquer Tel Aviv!”

I wasn’t too sure of this, but I said insh’allah anyway.

2This flight-psychosis, which prevailed among the Arabs and ultimately resulted in the frantic exodus of many Moslems and Christians, is a difficult phenomenon to explain. It was a mass hysteria induced by poor morale and by fear of revenge and retribution for the Arab massacres and lootings from 1920 on.

Arab leaders – particularly in the Mufti’s Arab Higher Committee – urged residents to clear the fighting areas, promising them that Palestine would be cleared of Jews within thirty days after the Mandate ended. After the Jews had been pushed into the seam Arab leaders said, Palestinians could return to their homes and at the same time share in the Jewish booty. They implied that those who refused to leave were pro-Zionist; such people were threatened with reprisals.

In contrast, I know of instances where the Jews begged the Arabs, particularly the Christian elements, to remain, guaranteeing their safety and full respect for property. These Christians, however, joined the fleeing Moslems, fearing the promised retribution following the promised Arab victory. As an instance, the Armenians, who had always got along well with Arab and Jew alike, joined the panicky Moslems, horror-stricken by the memory of the Turkish massacres.

Wealthy merchants, physicians, bankers, politicians, and other leaders were the first to leave. Later came the poorer elements until, by the time the Mandate expired, those remaining were largely only the ill and aged, the looters, and the innocents.

The exodus figure of 750,000 or more Arabs is sheer propaganda, a fictional number that cannot be supported by the facts. The populace in the country from Jerusalem north to Jericho was not disturbed by the fighting, nor were the Arabs and Christians resident in the congested areas within the quadrangle formed by Ramallah, Tulkarm, Jenin, and Nablus – Palestinian territory now annexed by Jordan. It must also be pointed out that many of the Moslem so-called refugees were homeless, nomadic wanderers in the first place. Poor, nonrefugee Arabs, such as those in Gaza, have claimed refugee status in order to qualify for American aid

2

For others who don’t know: the pogroms reached their peak in the mid-1930’s under the leadership of sheikh Amin al-Husseini - “Hitler’s mufti” who petitioned Adolf Eichmann for an extermination camp in Nablus during the holocaust. Husseini was Yasser Arafat’s uncle; Arafat was his heir. Husseini’s military leader was a former officer in the Ottoman Army: one Fawzi el Kawaukji. He was a Lebanese Druse who incited the Syrian uprisings against the French after the First World War.

An example of Kawaukji’s tactics:

'On 2 October(1938)…Kawaukji’s men raided Kiryat Shmuel, the ancient Jewish quarter of Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee. Eleven of the nineteen Jews they killed there were children…Some of the child victims were stabbed and then tossed into a burning synagogue.

To make matters worse a fresh British infantry battalion, the First Staffords, had just taken up garrison duties in the town and had done virtually nothing to prevent the massacre.

The rebels shrewdly decided to infiltrate the town on a Sunday when they had observed a good many of the British soldiers were usually off duty and unarmed and enjoying the resort’s facitilies. When the gang produced their hidden weapons and the killing started, some of the bewildered infantry, to whom Palestine had so far seemed reassuringly like a weekend at Blackpool, were seen cowering beneath cafe tables or behind cinema seats.

The remainder were easily pinned down in the old gray stone Turkish fort where they were quartered, allowing the rest of the gang to go about their butchery…the rebels decided to…open their looted liquor.’

BTW - the British were almost universally pro-Arab, refused to allow the Jews to arm or defend themselves, reneged on their promises multiple times(Balfour etc.), engaged in appeasement as they did in Europe, actively prevented Jewish refugees from arriving and then trying to get Jews to join the British army when the war started and so on. Oh, and from the 1920’s onwards the French allowed their regime in Syria to harbour and train Arab terrorists for attacks in the British mandate as part of their eternal enmity towards Britain, First World War alliance notwithstanding.

3

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

For others who don’t know: the pogroms reached their peak in the mid-1930’s under the leadership of sheikh Amin al-Husseini - “Hitler’s mufti” who petitioned Adolf Eichmann for an extermination camp in Nablus during the holocaust. Husseini was Yasser Arafat’s uncle; Arafat was his heir. Husseini’s military leader was a former officer in the Ottoman Army: one Fawzi el Kawaukji. He was a Lebanese Druse who incited the Syrian uprisings against the French after the First World War.

An example of Kawaukji’s tactics:

'On 2 October(1938)…Kawaukji’s men raided Kiryat Shmuel, the ancient Jewish quarter of Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee. Eleven of the nineteen Jews they killed there were children…Some of the child victims were stabbed and then tossed into a burning synagogue.

To make matters worse a fresh British infantry battalion, the First Staffords, had just taken up garrison duties in the town and had done virtually nothing to prevent the massacre.

The rebels shrewdly decided to infiltrate the town on a Sunday when they had observed a good many of the British soldiers were usually off duty and unarmed and enjoying the resort’s facitilies. When the gang produced their hidden weapons and the killing started, some of the bewildered infantry, to whom Palestine had so far seemed reassuringly like a weekend at Blackpool, were seen cowering beneath cafe tables or behind cinema seats.

The remainder were easily pinned down in the old gray stone Turkish fort where they were quartered, allowing the rest of the gang to go about their butchery…the rebels decided to…open their looted liquor.’

BTW - the British were almost universally pro-Arab, refused to allow the Jews to arm or defend themselves, reneged on their promises multiple times(Balfour etc.), engaged in appeasement as they did in Europe, actively prevented Jewish refugees from arriving and then trying to get Jews to join the British army when the war started and so on. Oh, and from the 1920’s onwards the French allowed their regime in Syria to harbour and train Arab terrorists for attacks in the British mandate as part of their eternal enmity towards Britain, First World War alliance notwithstanding.[/quote]

As I read more of Carlson and having read The Rape of Palestine, both of which reveal the perfidy of the British, the wonder is not that London is now Londonistan, but that there are any people at all who live there who are not engaged in jihad, marxism, Nazism or any anti democratic, murderous activity.

The normal English people are to be sympathised with.

4

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

BTW - the British were almost universally pro-Arab, refused to allow the Jews to arm or defend themselves, reneged on their promises multiple times(Balfour etc.), engaged in appeasement as they did in Europe, actively prevented Jewish refugees from arriving and then trying to get Jews to join the British army when the war started and so on. Oh, and from the 1920’s onwards the French allowed their regime in Syria to harbour and train Arab terrorists for attacks in the British mandate as part of their eternal enmity towards Britain, First World War alliance notwithstanding.[/quote]

I think this was the official British policy (mainly to avoid angering arabs in other areas who had oil), but individual Brits were largely OK.

I know of personally Brits who “lost” crates of machines guns, ammo, and heavy weaponry in Jewish villages during this time.

But the upper class Brits (e.g,. Prince Charles) do have a weird fixation on all things arab and traditionally disdain all things Jewish.

You can see this with the English Defense League, a rather traditionally thuggy crew, often associated with football rioters and racist skin heads.

For some reason(logic, I suppose, or perhaps enemy-of-my-enemy is my friend), they’ve become philo-semitic and have taken it upon themselves to openly defend Synagogues and escort Jewish people to shul.

In fact, I had a rather interesting 5+ hour trans-Atlantic flight to Heathrow with an EDL member who took it upon himself to inform me (in a barely-understandable Cockney accent) that “Jews were the bloody fucking canary in the coal mine,” in England and that EDL was racist, but “figured out that Jews were not the enemy and had been part of England for 1500 years.”

It was rather odd, and he still struck me as a dangerous guy, but fit in with what I had heard.

5

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

BTW - the British were almost universally pro-Arab, refused to allow the Jews to arm or defend themselves, reneged on their promises multiple times(Balfour etc.), engaged in appeasement as they did in Europe, actively prevented Jewish refugees from arriving and then trying to get Jews to join the British army when the war started and so on. Oh, and from the 1920’s onwards the French allowed their regime in Syria to harbour and train Arab terrorists for attacks in the British mandate as part of their eternal enmity towards Britain, First World War alliance notwithstanding.[/quote]

I think this was the official British policy (mainly to avoid angering arabs in other areas who had oil), but individual Brits were largely OK.

I know of personally Brits who “lost” crates of machines guns, ammo, and heavy weaponry in Jewish villages during this time.

But the upper class Brits (e.g,. Prince Charles) do have a weird fixation on all things arab and traditionally disdain all things Jewish.

You can see this with the English Defense League, a rather traditionally thuggy crew, often associated with football rioters and racist skin heads.

For some reason(logic, I suppose, or perhaps enemy-of-my-enemy is my friend), they’ve become philo-semitic and have taken it upon themselves to openly defend Synagogues and escort Jewish people to shul.

In fact, I had a rather interesting 5+ hour trans-Atlantic flight to Heathrow with an EDL member who took it upon himself to inform me (in a barely-understandable Cockney accent) that “Jews were the bloody fucking canary in the coal mine,” in England and that EDL was racist, but “figured out that Jews were not the enemy and had been part of England for 1500 years.”

It was rather odd, and he still struck me as a dangerous guy, but fit in with what I had heard.[/quote]

KJV. The Brits figured they were the new Jews or chosen people.

6

[quote]But the upper class Brits (e.g,. Prince Charles) do have a weird fixation on all things arab and traditionally disdain all things Jewish.
[/quote]

I believe in part it’s to do with a fashion for ‘orientalism’ that was popular in the 19th century in much of Europe. Many British aristocracy/upper classes admired Bedouin as ‘noble savages’ and so on.

7

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

BTW - the British were almost universally pro-Arab, refused to allow the Jews to arm or defend themselves, reneged on their promises multiple times(Balfour etc.), engaged in appeasement as they did in Europe, actively prevented Jewish refugees from arriving and then trying to get Jews to join the British army when the war started and so on. Oh, and from the 1920’s onwards the French allowed their regime in Syria to harbour and train Arab terrorists for attacks in the British mandate as part of their eternal enmity towards Britain, First World War alliance notwithstanding.[/quote]

I think this was the official British policy (mainly to avoid angering arabs in other areas who had oil), but individual Brits were largely OK.

I know of personally Brits who “lost” crates of machines guns, ammo, and heavy weaponry in Jewish villages during this time.

But the upper class Brits (e.g,. Prince Charles) do have a weird fixation on all things arab and traditionally disdain all things Jewish.

You can see this with the English Defense League, a rather traditionally thuggy crew, often associated with football rioters and racist skin heads.

For some reason(logic, I suppose, or perhaps enemy-of-my-enemy is my friend), they’ve become philo-semitic and have taken it upon themselves to openly defend Synagogues and escort Jewish people to shul.

In fact, I had a rather interesting 5+ hour trans-Atlantic flight to Heathrow with an EDL member who took it upon himself to inform me (in a barely-understandable Cockney accent) that “Jews were the bloody fucking canary in the coal mine,” in England and that EDL was racist, but “figured out that Jews were not the enemy and had been part of England for 1500 years.”

It was rather odd, and he still struck me as a dangerous guy, but fit in with what I had heard.[/quote]

KJV. The Brits figured they were the new Jews or chosen people. [/quote]

I don’t think replacement theology had much to with that. That’s primaily Lutherans, and across the channel.

8

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

BTW - the British were almost universally pro-Arab, refused to allow the Jews to arm or defend themselves, reneged on their promises multiple times(Balfour etc.), engaged in appeasement as they did in Europe, actively prevented Jewish refugees from arriving and then trying to get Jews to join the British army when the war started and so on. Oh, and from the 1920’s onwards the French allowed their regime in Syria to harbour and train Arab terrorists for attacks in the British mandate as part of their eternal enmity towards Britain, First World War alliance notwithstanding.[/quote]

I think this was the official British policy (mainly to avoid angering arabs in other areas who had oil), but individual Brits were largely OK.

I know of personally Brits who “lost” crates of machines guns, ammo, and heavy weaponry in Jewish villages during this time.

But the upper class Brits (e.g,. Prince Charles) do have a weird fixation on all things arab and traditionally disdain all things Jewish.

You can see this with the English Defense League, a rather traditionally thuggy crew, often associated with football rioters and racist skin heads.

For some reason(logic, I suppose, or perhaps enemy-of-my-enemy is my friend), they’ve become philo-semitic and have taken it upon themselves to openly defend Synagogues and escort Jewish people to shul.

In fact, I had a rather interesting 5+ hour trans-Atlantic flight to Heathrow with an EDL member who took it upon himself to inform me (in a barely-understandable Cockney accent) that “Jews were the bloody fucking canary in the coal mine,” in England and that EDL was racist, but “figured out that Jews were not the enemy and had been part of England for 1500 years.”

It was rather odd, and he still struck me as a dangerous guy, but fit in with what I had heard.[/quote]

Just wanted to say thank you Jewbacca, I always find your posts very educational and interesting.

9

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:
For some reason(logic, I suppose, or perhaps enemy-of-my-enemy is my friend), they’ve become philo-semitic and have taken it upon themselves to openly defend Synagogues and escort Jewish people to shul.

[/quote]

Most the leadership(BNP and EDL) are rotten to the core but some of the rank and file are okay. The BNP leaders are neo-Nazis who pulled a switcheroo after the 7/7 bombings to gain support from people concerned about Islamisation. EDL is led by former BNP neo-Nazi Yaxley-Lennon. He tried to start an Australian chapter a while back. BNP/EDL are both top-down organisations where the paid rank and file have no say and mostly no real understanding of the agenda of the leadership. The football casuals are just idiots.

10

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:
[
I know of personally Brits who “lost” crates of machines guns, ammo, and heavy weaponry in Jewish villages during this time.

[/quote]

Do you have any detailed anecdotes about this? I’d be interested in knowing more.
Brave boys they must have been, going against official lines!!

11

[quote]'nuffsaid wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:
[
I know of personally Brits who “lost” crates of machines guns, ammo, and heavy weaponry in Jewish villages during this time.

[/quote]

Do you have any detailed anecdotes about this? I’d be interested in knowing more.
Brave boys they must have been, going against official lines!![/quote]

I don’t know if I could still get people in trouble, age 80 or not, so no, I don’t have detailed anecdotes.

But, in general, it was “miscounts” of boxes getting unloaded, leaving warehouses unloaded and unguarded at specified times, and “accidently” leaving detailed aerial reconance maps at that Jewish pub. (The arabs didn’t drink, but Jewish folk enjoy a nice cup of ale, too.)

Nastier (and sadder) events include the enlisted guards being told to leave the King David Hotel at a specified time so they didn’t get hit by the blast.

Keep in mind a lot of the enlisted British soldiers had served in Europe proper in WWII, seen the concentration camps, knew the arabs were still led by Nazi Germans (who fled to Syria, et al), and were just itching for someone to kick the arabs’ asses.

12

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

Keep in mind a lot of the enlisted British soldiers had served in Europe proper in WWII, seen the concentration camps, knew the arabs were still led by Nazi Germans (who fled to Syria, et al), and were just itching for someone to kick the arabs’ asses.[/quote]

I should point out I was talking specifically about the inter-war period - i.e. before WWII. Amongst other things I remember reading Moshe Dayan, Zvi Brenner and 41 other British-trained Special Night Squadsmen were arrested for “drilling with unauthorized weapons” and subsequently convicted and sentenced for 10 years in prison(pardoned after 18 months) at the start of the war.

13

The EDL are a bunch of thugs. I had the misfortune to be in manchester when there was a demonstration there. However the fact such a political party can exist is proof to me that many central political parties have heads in the sand.

jewbacca, I’ve heard a lot about tacit British support for the Israelis pre-1948, especially in the NCO level that wasn’t supported by the officer class or the political elite. Your post confirms that

14

'One NCO described the views of the common British soldier this way: “Certainly, the Jews were white, but they didn’t speak English. Yes, they worked like hell - few of us had ever seen Jews work like that before and they turned great sandy deserts into beautiful green oases with oranges, lemons and, yes, even fresh vegetables. But give me the Arab every time, said Tommy Atkins.” - Fire in the Night by John Bierman and Colin Smith

15

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:
For some reason(logic, I suppose, or perhaps enemy-of-my-enemy is my friend), they’ve become philo-semitic and have taken it upon themselves to openly defend Synagogues and escort Jewish people to shul.

[/quote]

Most the leadership(BNP and EDL) are rotten to the core but some of the rank and file are okay. The BNP leaders are neo-Nazis who pulled a switcheroo after the 7/7 bombings to gain support from people concerned about Islamisation. EDL is led by former BNP neo-Nazi Yaxley-Lennon. He tried to start an Australian chapter a while back. BNP/EDL are both top-down organisations where the paid rank and file have no say and mostly no real understanding of the agenda of the leadership. The football casuals are just idiots.[/quote]

You are the idiot. The whole political landscape in Europe is fucked.

You say the BNP leadership is rotten to the core as if the leadership of the lib/lab/con or the head of the EU are perfectly wonderful. They are all socialists, Marxists or communists. European commission president Jose Barroso was a leader of the Maoist MRPP. Mao murdered on a scale that far exceeded Hitler. I don’t get how you can accuse some minor politicians of being neo nazis but ignore the Maoist head of the EU without expecting to get called out on your hypocrisy.

You accuse the BNP of top down leadership, but what about the labour party or the conservatives? Gordon Brown signed the UK on to the EU constitution without the peoples permission. He signed away the nation’s sovereignty despite the majority of people being against it. The tories election manifesto promised a referendum on the EU constitution. David Cameron said he was giving his iron clad pledge to finally give the people a referendum. Then when Iron clad Dave got elected he reneged on his election promise.

16

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]'nuffsaid wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:
[
I know of personally Brits who “lost” crates of machines guns, ammo, and heavy weaponry in Jewish villages during this time.

[/quote]

Do you have any detailed anecdotes about this? I’d be interested in knowing more.
Brave boys they must have been, going against official lines!![/quote]

I don’t know if I could still get people in trouble, age 80 or not, so no, I don’t have detailed anecdotes.

But, in general, it was “miscounts” of boxes getting unloaded, leaving warehouses unloaded and unguarded at specified times, and “accidently” leaving detailed aerial reconance maps at that Jewish pub. (The arabs didn’t drink, but Jewish folk enjoy a nice cup of ale, too.)

Nastier (and sadder) events include the enlisted guards being told to leave the King David Hotel at a specified time so they didn’t get hit by the blast.

Keep in mind a lot of the enlisted British soldiers had served in Europe proper in WWII, seen the concentration camps, knew the arabs were still led by Nazi Germans (who fled to Syria, et al), and were just itching for someone to kick the arabs’ asses.[/quote]

It’s been a while since I studied this history so there could be some factual inaccuracies but what I remember of it is this. During the war Palestinian Jews joined the British army and formed several Jewish battalions. Eventually there was a hand picked group of several thousand they called the Jewish brigade. So the British trained and equipped them. After the war they put their training, skills, contacts in the British military and chutzpah to good use.

One of the things they would do is get ahold of army trucks that they then used to transport Jewish refugees from former concentration camps that they had been forced back into to ports in southern Europe where they could then board ships headed to Israel. Another thing they would do is infiltrate British army bases and steal supplies which they passed on to the Haganah.

17

[quote]Sifu wrote:

You are the idiot. The whole political landscape in Europe is fucked.

You say the BNP leadership is rotten to the core as if the leadership of the lib/lab/con or the head of the EU are perfectly wonderful.

[/quote]

Well I haven’t managed to blow out my own eye with a shotgun cartridge yet so Griffin is one up on me there. And I didn’t say it “as if the leadership of the lib/lab/con or the head of the EU are perfectly wonderful.” I just said it. Nick Griffins’ orginal crew are all multiple felons and neo-Nazis. And they’re idiots.

I’ve said as much myself.

I’ve said the same thing numerous times about Europe. However, I’m not just throwing out accusations. Griffins’ crew are neo-Nazis. But I’m not going to write up an expose of the BNP leadership.

I agree. But that’s a topic for another thread.

18

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
'One NCO described the views of the common British soldier this way: “Certainly, the Jews were white, but they didn’t speak English. Yes, they worked like hell - few of us had ever seen Jews work like that before and they turned great sandy deserts into beautiful green oases with oranges, lemons and, yes, even fresh vegetables. But give me the Arab every time, said Tommy Atkins.” - Fire in the Night by John Bierman and Colin Smith[/quote]

Lots of people write books full of crap or selectively edit to fit their agenda.

There were (and remain) hard feelings by-and-between the British and Israeli. I don’t doubt there are plenty of crappy things said by both sides.

I wasn’t there. I just know what my family told me about the post war – the official Brit line was pro-arab, but the men of first line officers down were pro-Jewish.

19

[quote]Bambi wrote:
The EDL are a bunch of thugs. I had the misfortune to be in manchester when there was a demonstration there. However the fact such a political party can exist is proof to me that many central political parties have heads in the sand.

jewbacca, I’ve heard a lot about tacit British support for the Israelis pre-1948, especially in the NCO level that wasn’t supported by the officer class or the political elite. Your post confirms that[/quote]

Yeah, my one experience was one guy in a long flight. He was OK, but clearly half off his rocker.

20

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

Lots of people write books full of crap or selectively edit to fit their agenda.

[/quote]

The authors are both British military historians and not Zionists of any stripe. It’s a biography of Maj. Gen. Orde Wingate. Their agenda as far as I could see was to defend against criticism that the Chindits had little military value in Burma.